The darkness surrounded him, as if he had been swallowed by some horrible beast. As far as he knew, that's exactly what happened.

"You cannot fight it boy," a raspy voice said. "Sooner or later, you will become one with me."

"Never!" he spat. "I'll die before I ever let you take control of me!"

"If that's the way you feel," the voice replied ominously.

He was a prisoner to the darkness. The voice wanted to possess him. It wanted to control him. It wanted to destroy him. But he couldn't let it. He couldn't put his friends in that kind of danger.

Still, he could only hold on for so long before he cracked. Even the strongest substance in the world would break like a twig if put under enough pressure in the right circumstance.

Suddenly, pain filled his body, going right to his very core. It was excruciating. His bones felt like they were breaking from within. His lungs felt like they were melting to goo. His skin felt like it was peeling off layer by layer. His eyes burned like somebody poured lava into them. His head felt like it was splitting, as if he were Zeus giving birth to the goddess Athena. He couldn't scream even if he wanted to. His throat felt as if he had been forced to swallow broken glass, followed by an entire bottle of vodka.

Then, the pain stopped as soon as it came. He was left on his bloody hands and knees, gasping for breath. He couldn't cry, not that he would because he didn't want to give his tormentor the satisfaction. All that was left from the episode were aches. Everything ached so very, very much.

"Had enough?" the voice asked in an amused tone. The shadows had darkened around him, as if they were feeding off his torment. "You can end it you know. It can all be over. It can be just another nightmare. You know how make this go away."

He looked in the direction the voice was coming from with a determined glint in his sky colored eyes. There was a sharp, almost eager intake of breath. It thought it finally won. Soon, it could set its foul plans in motion. All it needed was him to utter the three golden words that would—

"Go to Hell."

"The Ultimate Wrath," Bayonetta mused as she studied the overweight penguin before her. "Now why would you assume that I know anything about that?"

King Dedede shifted uncomfortably under her gaze. Normally, he would avoid the witch at any cost, but he couldn't for the life of him figure out what Ganon's mumblings were about. Every time he thought about them, a shiver went down his spine. Usually Ganondorf's mumblings were about his next plan to take over Hyrule, but something about this particular mumbling felt off. It somehow felt more ominous than usual.

So, King Dedede was left with few options but to go to Bayonetta. After all, if Ganon was planning something that involved this "ultimate wrath," then he needed to know what it was. He needed to be prepared like he was last time.

"I figured it was something right up your alley," he replied.

"The ultimate wrath could refer to many different things. How did you know to come to me?"

In truth, King Dedede had no idea how he knew to come to Bayonetta. After all, she wasn't the only one in the mansion who knew about magic. He figured he could have gone to one of the Robins claiming that he needed to know for "intellectual purposes" and they would have given him the information he needed. But something about going to Bayonetta felt right. It was almost like something was subconsciously steering him towards her.

"Look," he said impatiently, "can you help me or not?"

"It depends," Bayonetta replied with a shrug. The witch was a sly one. Of course there was a price attached.

She actively hunted angels, but that didn't mean she hadn't picked anything up from them. Her knowledge of their society was only rivaled by Pit's, who was one of them and had actively participated in their society at one point. She was, however, the only one of the two willing to share her knowledge with those who asked, which made it a valuable commodity. Really, she'd be stupid to not put a price tag on it.

"Look, lady, if you want money, then you can forget it."

The Umbra witch let out a soft laugh. "You think I want money? That's cute. No, your majesty... I want a favor."

King Dedede narrowed his eyes suspiciously. This wouldn't be the first time that somebody had attached something like this as their price for information. "What kind of favor?"

Bayonetta smiled coyly. "A favor that's for me to know and you to find out when I need it."

She knew how to play her cards just right. She had heard of Dedede's badges that saved the day, and she knew that there was a storm brewing in the mansion. Dedede was out to save his own neck, which could be beneficial to her. But, she needed to let him believe that she had no idea that she knew why he wanted her help.

And, how often could one say that a king was indebted to them?

Lightning flashed brilliantly across the unholy pitch black sky. The wind howled like a vicious beast, rattling the mansion's shutters and ripping leaves off the trees. Thunder boomed off in the distance, giving the illusion that someone was firing cannons. But strangely enough, there was no rain.

"Something's happening tonight," Lucario muttered to himself as he watched the display outside from a window. "That can be the only explanation."

The door slowly creaked open behind him. The Pokémon quickly turned around, his paws ignited a bright blue with his aura as he prepared to defend himself. Lucario quickly let down his defenses when he saw who it was.

"Pika, pika!"

"Hello Pikachu," Lucario greeted. "Sorry, I thought you were somebody else."

"Pi, pika!" the electric type replied.

"You sense it too? There is something strange about this storm… I don't have a clue what it means."

"Pikachu?"

"No, but whatever it is, it can't be good."

Pikachu hesitantly crawled up to the window to get a good look at the storm that was raging outside. Lucario stepped aside to make room for his fellow Pokémon. The two stood in silence for a while as they watched.

"It just came on so suddenly," Lucario commented.

"Pika…" Pikachu agreed. He sounded somewhat worried. Suddenly, the electric type Pokémon yelped and jumped backwards. Lucario stumbled backwards as the tree in front of the window split in half.

Pikachu filled his cheeks with electricity and started growling. "Pi…"

Any doubt in their mind about the unnaturalness of the storm was wiped from their minds by the sight of deep purple lightning illuminating the sky.

Marth paced the hallway nervously. In his experience, a stormy night was never a good omen. It was particularly troubling, especially after Master Hand's announcement about the missing shadow bugs.

Everyone in the mansion had been on edge ever since the news broke. The feeling of mistrust that hung in the air during dinner was so thick that Marth could have cut it with the dullest blade in the world. The tension was so overwhelming that the slightest noise would have caused the shaky peace to descend into absolute chaos.

Marth had taken it upon himself to patrol the hallways, looking for the slightest hint of suspicious activity. Of course, the usual suspicious activity was hard to distinguish from potentially malicious suspicious activity.

Wario, of course, was partaking in his various, most likely illegal dealings, so that meant that Marth had caught many shady figures. The prince had a feeling that Wario was selling illicit substances and contraband; however he couldn't exactly prove it. Wario may be lazy, but he wasn't sloppy (at least when it came to his various money making schemes), so there wasn't any solid evidence that he was actually committing a crime.

A noise off to the side interrupted Marth from his musings. Drawing his sword, he quickly put himself up against the wall. He was alone, and he had no idea what he was up against. He knew he should have asked Ike or Link to be his backup, but hindsight is always 20/20.

Quietly, he got close enough to the game room that he could hear, but not too close so he could quickly duck out of sight, if need be.

"So you came," Wario's voice grunted. "Figured it'd be a night like tonight."

Nobody answered, but Marth could tell that there were in fact two people in the room. The prince felt his gut sink. There was something off about Wario's mysterious client.

"What?" Wario demanded gruffly. "Am I going to be doing all the talking?"

There was still no response, causing the minigame proprietor to huff in disgust. The was a loud bump that sounded almost as if he was slamming a glass on the wooden coffee table.

"Look, you little bastard," Wario growled, "I risked my neck to get this for you, and only because you promised to pay well. If Master Hand were to find out I'm the one who took this, well, it wouldn't end well for me. The least you could do is answer me."

Marth was taken aback. It took every fiber of his being not to gasp in shock. If Master Hand found out… No, it couldn't be… There was no way… Was there?

Everyone knew that Wario would do anything for money, but surely the minigame proprietor wasn't the one who stole the missing shadow bugs… right?

"Ouch!" Bowser growled as Dr. Mario swabbed his wounds with hydrogen peroxide. "Watch it!"

Dr. Mario glared at the Koopa King but said nothing as he put a freshly soaked piece of cotton on the wound, causing Bowser to howl again. Ganondorf got a few hits in during their fight earlier, but the open wounds came from Link's sword when he intervened. Because he acquired the injuries outside of a match, Bowser would have to suffer until they healed naturally.

But Bowser was still fuming over what happened earlier to even care. How dare Ganondorf even think about going near his son, let alone try to hurt him. Had Bowser not intervened when he did, the King of Evil surely would have done something to hurt Jr. and those two heroes. After all, that Ness would have told Ganon something that was bound to enrage him.

Dr. Mario began wrapping Bowser's cuts. "Change the bandages daily. Watch out for signs of infection. If it's not healing within two weeks, come and see me."

"Whatever," Bowser scoffed as he tugged experimentally at the bandages, earning a stern glare from the doctor.

Suddenly, Zelda frantically burst into the infirmary. She yanked back the curtains surrounding the few hospital beds, and groaned in frustration when she didn't find what she was looking for. Falco entered a few moments later.

"Anything?" she demanded.

The bird shook his head. "Nothing. Ike and Corrin said he wasn't in the training room, Wario didn't know who I was even talking about, he wasn't in the library with either of the Robins, Marth's on patrol and hasn't seen him, Link says he wasn't in his room, and Peach says she hasn't seen him all day."

"Who are you looking for?" Dr. Mario asked as he handed Bowser his release papers.

"We can't find him anywhere, Dr. Mario!" Zelda cried. "He's not answering anyone's calls. Where could he have gone? Could someone have broken into the mansion and kidnapped him?"

Falco scoffed. "Please. He may be the most naive person I know, but I know for a fact that he would have put up a fight if that were the case. We would have heard something."

"But it's not like him to just vanish," Zelda said worriedly. "What if he's hurt?"

"I'm sure he's around here somewhere," Falco insisted, but he didn't seem very convinced himself.

"Have either of you seen him anywhere?" Zelda asked the doctor and koopa king.

Both villain and doctor shared a bemused look. Zelda was normally level headed. It was so unlike her to be this frantic.

"Who?" Bowser demanded.

He was afraid of her answer, not that he'd ever admit that. What if something had happened to Jr. while Bowser was getting his injuries treated? What if Ganon had hurt his son out of revenge? He was going to murder the King of the Gerudos if he so much as laid a hand on—

"Pit, of course. We can't find him anywhere."

Again, I still don't own SSB or its characters.